The Fake Boyfriend Experiment by Stephanie Rowe Page B

forget it?”
    I grinned, too relieved to take offense at how grumpy he sounded. “I’ll play on one condition.”
    He groaned. “What condition?”
    “You won’t be a jerk to me the whole time.”
    He snorted. “Fine. I’ll be a jerk only some of the time.”
    “Rafe!”
    He coughed to cover his laughter. Jerk. “Six o’clock tomorrow at Mueller-Fordham. Plan to stay late. We have a gig a week from Saturday and you have a lot of music to learn.”
    I tripped on the stairs. “A what ? ”
    “Gig. We’re booked to play a middle school dance. See ya.”
    I stared at the phone. A gig? Like a piano recital in disguise, only this time I’d have Rafe glaring at me instead of my piano teacher looming over me.
    This completely sucked. What had I gotten myself into?
    But I couldn’t help but grin. Yes, there might be some major suckitude going on, but my life had suddenly become interesting. Crazy and insane, and I had no idea how it was going to turn out, but I was excited to find out.
    * * *
     
    At five minutes before six on Friday, Erin’s mom pulled up in front of Mueller-Fordham to drop me off for band practice. Band practice! How much better did that sound than piano lessons? I was moving up in the world, for sure.
    Erin’s mom had taken the four of us to the mall to shop for new bikinis for the pool party on Saturday, which I was now attending since I didn’t have a recital. I was so excited, but nervous too. It wasn’t as if things had gone well with Les on Thursday, and now I was going to have to find a way to be interesting for an entire afternoon? While wearing a bikini!
    I’d never had a bikini before. Now I did. Black. Completely sexy. I felt naked with it on and there was no way I was going to wear it at the pool party in front of boys. I was so keeping my shirt on over it.
    I’d bought it anyway, because, well, I had to. Like I wasn’t going to buy it when Val, Delilah and Erin had all bought bikinis. Though I had to admit, I was kind of excited about it. I really was.
    I’d been so pumped to spend the afternoon with my friends, but in actuality, it had been kind of miserable. Nothing like discovering you’re the only one still wearing a stretchy, white junior bra to make you feel like a dork. My friends had all gone to Victoria Secret over the summer and bought real bras.
    Nice of them to tell me before I’d yanked off my shirt in the dressing room and they all started cracking up. Even my belly button ring hadn’t been enough to save me.
    But that was over now, because Erin’s mom had bought me a new bra that had padding and lace, plus I was about to head into band practice with my fake boyfriend. Band practice! A tattooed drummer! Keyboard! I mean, really, how cool was that? And I was even wearing clothes I liked: a pair of ripped jeans that were way too tight for any proper pianist, and a strappy tank that was cut so low that Crusty would probably call it obscene. I loved it! For the first time in ages, I was actually looking forward to getting out of the car and into the music school.
    Of course, that might have something to do with the fact I was about to go play with Rafe. You think? Maybe we would have our own private jam session like we had last time, when we’d totally connected with our music.
    “Can we come in with you?” Val asked. “I want to meet Rafe.”
    Oh… yeah, that would be a good idea. Not. “No.” I hugged my shopping bag to my chest as I recalled that Rafe was still not completely in the Lily fan club at the moment. My excitement faded, drained away by the memory of how angry he’d been at me for forcing him into using me as their keyboard player. After my humiliation of this afternoon, I was so not up for dealing with Rafe’s hostility. Wasn’t the first day of my Crusty-free existence supposed to be perfect?
    “Why can’t we meet him?” Val nudged me, her dark brown curls tumbling wildly over her shoulder. “Does Rafe even exist? Who wants to bet that